garbled

adjective

gar·​bled ˈgär-bəld 

: made unclear or confusing : distorted or mixed up

a garbled message

garbled speech

… scientific cranks—those folks who concoct garbled and grandiose pseudo-scientific theories …

—Robert W. Wilson

A garbled group of syllables came over the speaker.

—Tom Clancy

But so much happened afterward to him that his five-day drive from Cracow to Warsaw soon became a garbled fading memory.

—Herman Wouk

Since the algorithm relies on the absolute accuracy of everything it has read to build the file, garbled information could lead to any number of mistakes.

—Paul C. Schuytema

Examples of garbled in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

The complaint says the competition that was harmed was between platforms (like X/Twitter and Facebook, for example) but that’s a bit garbled. —Jon Brodkin, Ars Technica, 9 Aug. 2024

Meyers also called out a garbled answer from Trump. —Kevin Dolak, The Hollywood Reporter, 14 Aug. 2024

In the wake of the Trump assassination attempt, the chatbot was sharing garbled and entirely inaccurate details about the incident. —Isabel Fraser, WIRED, 18 July 2024

During the June 27 debate against Trump, the president struggled to maintain his train of thought and at times delivered garbled responses to simple questions. —Dan Mangan, CNBC, 11 July 2024

Word History

First Known Use

circa 1757, in the meaning defined above